Lebanon Pot Case Has Potential to Backfire

[Silent_Bob]

http://www.vnews.com/News/Local-Regional/Disabled-Veteran-s-Medical-Marijuana-Case-Attracts-New-Lawyer-1464842

The Lebanon cops' obsession with marijuana is strange. Last year, they averaged three pot busts a week, which I guess is their idea of a crime wave, but not mine.

But when they arrested Tom Orkney, a disabled Navy veteran, for smoking marijuana in his own home last April, they might have gone a little too far.

The case has dragged on for nearly a year. And I have a feeling it's about to get a lot more interesting.

Why's that?

Paul Twomey, a criminal defense attorney from southern New Hampshire who has handled more than his share of high-profile cases over the years, has agreed to represent Orkney for free. (Twomey and his law partner, Mark Sisti, defended Pamela Smart in her initial murder trial in 1991.)

Twomey was most recently in the news for his efforts on behalf of Linda Horan, a 64-year-old labor activist with terminal lung cancer, who successfully sued the state last year to obtain a medical marijuana ID card so she could purchase the drug in Maine. (Horan died Feb. 1.)

The national media picked up on Horan's plight. I'm not sure the same will happen in Orkney's case.

But even the possibility can't be welcome news at Lebanon City Council chambers or the Lebanon Chamber of Commerce. Does Lebanon want to be known nationally as a community where police bust disabled vets for smoking weed in the privacy of their own homes?

You don't get much more backwater than that.

The details of the April 25, 2015, incident certainly don't make a favorable impression.

Three Lebanon police officers were investigating a "domestic issue" in the apartment building on School Street where Tom and his wife, Kari, lived. While standing in the hallway, the officers said they could smell the odor of freshly burnt marijuana coming from the Orkneys' apartment.

The cops rapped on the door, and shortly thereafter Tom Orkney was handcuffed and placed in the back of a cruiser. While still inside his apartment, Orkney had shown police his medical marijuana license from the state of Washington. He'd been using medical marijuana with a doctor's permission since 2010 to combat severe headaches and a mood disorder.

Police said his license to use medical marijuana in Washington was worthless in New Hampshire. Orkney was charged with possessing a small amount of marijuana, which is punishable by a fine of up to $1,200, plus court fees.

After I wrote last May about Orkney's arrest, Manchester attorney Brandon Ross offered to take his case without charge. But after nearly a year of trying to resolve the case, Ross had to give it up to focus on his paying clients.

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about Orkney losing his attorney. That's when I got an email from Twomey. The New England office of the Marijuana Policy Project, a Washington, D.C.-based organization that's working to end marijuana prohibition, had sent Twomey the column.

Twomey asked me how to reach Orkney. I put the two in touch.

On Monday, Twomey made the 90-minute drive from Manchester to Surry, N.H., a small town near Keene, where the Orkneys are renting a home. (They moved out of Lebanon shortly after the incident with police.)

Although he's still sifting through the police and court records, Twomey told me Tuesday that he's glad he took the case.

"I'm at the stage (of my legal career) that I have the luxury of doing what I want to do," he said. "I take cases that interest me."

Orkney's case shows the need for the state to "re-examine what it's doing" in its approach to marijuana, Twomey said. (New Hampshire is the only New England state that hasn't decriminalized the possession of small amounts of pot.)

In 2013, New Hampshire passed a law allowing for the medical use of marijuana, but three years later it has yet to be implemented.

Twomey, 67, served as the House of Representatives' legal counsel on the bill. "So I have a pretty good sense of what the sponsors intended," he said. "The Legislature wanted people treated like patients; not criminals. That's something the law enforcement community has had a hard time coming to grips with."

As Orkney's case demonstrates.

When I was at the courthouse on Monday, Lebanon Police Prosecutor Ben LeDuc told me that a plea offer to Orkney remains "on the table."

If Orkney pleads guilty to violating a city ordinance that prohibits the possession of drug paraphernalia, Lebanon will drop the misdemeanor pot charge.

Cops and prosecutors can't walk away from a case — no matter how frivolous it might be — without getting something.

It probably makes sense for Orkney to take the deal. He won't risk getting a criminal record and it will save him a substantial amount of money. In Lebanon District Court, first-time pot offenders are typically hit with a $500 fine, plus $100 in court fees.

The violation of the city ordinance carries a $100 fine, with the possibility of it being suspended, if Orkney stays out of trouble for a year.

He also has health considerations. Orkney has already suffered three heart attacks, and I don't imagine the stress of a trial would do him good.

So the city might end up catching an undeserving break. But if it goes to trial, it could be a case worth watching.

[Free libertarian]

Maybe "the state" will finally produce the mysterious NH Controlled drug schedule ?  They seem to have misplaced it a time or two. 

Of course if they had published it in a newspaper over the years as their laws said they must, to notify people of that which is illegal, they could just go to some archive and retrieve it.     

Maybe they could find that "social contract"  thing too,  I must have been high when  I signed that one, cuz I can't seem to remember getting a copy for me.